The Rescue
by KingAlanI
Summary: By Alan Gilfoy in the world of K.A. Applegate. Here, the Animorphs do manage to rescue Tom from the Yeerk pool. The POD of that canon divergence AU is at the end of #1 The Invasion. Also, this is set starting in 2014.
1. The Rescue

Jake, in his tiger form, managed to run up to a human and knock him down with a paw swipe. He was raiding the Yeerk Pool right now in order to free his older brother, but Thomas Berenson was not cooperating.

.

Tom had been locked in a cage while his slavemaster fed, and when released, went into a futile rage against his master's master. Jake had just barely stopped his brother's unarmed charge on Visser Three. Even the Andalite tail he'd stolen couldn't reach far enough.

.

((You won't get away for long, Andalite bandits!)) the Visser raged, as he was wont to do.

((We still have to worry, but we aren't Andalites,)) Marco the gorilla whispered to his rapidly retreating comrades.

.

((In desperation, an Andalite warrior clinging to life gave five humans the power to morph,)) Jake explained. ((One of whom was your younger brother.))

"So it was you riding to my rescue," Tom said, his first words as a free man, an ability lost when becoming a full member of The Sharing. Jake's natural body was nightmarishly coalescing out of that of the tiger. "Thank you," his big brother cried.

.

He took in the scene around him. "Apparently Marco knows something about gorilla warfare," he said to someone who knew how to appreciate bad jokes. "Cass is definitely a workhorse," Tom added, referring to the only one not looking like a monster while reassuming human form.

.

"Tobias! Demorph!" Jake said anxiously to their fifth.

((It's too late,)) the bird whispered. He had left earlier for this mission, and hid longer during it before making his escape. That was the curse of the gift – those assuming a form for more than two hours were stuck in it. ((This is who I am now. Worse things to be than a red-tailed hawk.))

"Like a bullied orphan?" Tom guessed of one of his brother's close friends. That brought an awkward silence, and all involved left it at that.

.

There was nothing odd about the five walking together to Cassie's home with a bird flying overhead. However, the conversation was most highly unusual. The Animorphs were happy they'd freed Tom. Some of the other humans had run off. More's the pity, since most other free humans would call them insane if attempting to recount their stories. Some had died, and the Animorphs didn't want to dwell on how that compared to being a Controller.

.

The Animorphs realized that they _had_ obtained a very valuable source of intelligence on the Yeerks. "They take our parents?" Jake worried.

"Hell no," a relieved Tom said. "But the filshiging dapsens behind The Sharing wanted me to recruit them too." The Sharing was a Yeerk front organization. The Yeerk in Tom's head insisted that Jake go. Jake knew better. Apparently many people didn't. Tom had resisted, but the Yeerks had taken him anyway. The Yeerks tried to talk people into becoming their hosts. What sort of sad person would fall prey to that?

((Could've been me, but Jake had my back,)) Tobias said. Jake and Tobias had become friends when Jake caught two guys giving Tobias a swirlie. Such abuse might have led Tobias to join The Sharing, where he would've been protected, though at a terrible price.

The Sharing was run by Hedrick Chapman, vice principal at their middle school. He'd ensure it was the Yeerks' job to abuse them, not petty school punks. How many of their classmates had taken that path? That was one of the most harrowing parts of this fight. Anybody could be a Controller, acting normally except when directly involved in Yeerk activities. Temrash one-one-four, the Yeerk that had been in Tom's head, had done his best to act like Tom's normal self.

.

"What are filshiging dapsens anyway?" Marco wondered.

"It's Yeerk for _motherfucking assholes_," Tom explained.

"So you made sure to learn the curse words?" Marco said.

"I used to do that with Earth languages, pieza de merda," Tom went on.

"It's pedazo de mierda," Marco explained, giving better Spanish for 'piece of shit'. _He probably didn't learn that at home, though his mother is Latina_, Jake thought. _Was. _She disappeared nearly two years ago. Her body was never found, just the wreckage of the family boat.

.

They arrived at Cassie's barn and could now talk more freely. "People will _wonder why_ I _quit The Sharing_," Tom warned.

"Our parents can know, but nobody else can," Jake suggested.

"It's not just that. If anybody sees me, they'll know I escaped. Then they might find the rest of us. If I lie low, they might think I got killed trying to run away," Tom countered. Visser Three had morphed some sort of octopus hellbeast that spat fireballs.

.

"Can't much file a missing persons report, you know as well as I do that the cops are full of Controllers," Tom pointed out

"As if the LAPD couldn't get any more obnoxious," Cassie spat out.

.

"So some idiot teenagers with a death wish are our best hope. This is some _Red Dawn_ shit," Marco observed.

"Hope we're at least the 1984 version and not the 2012 one," Tom retorted.

"We could acquire wolverine morphs," Cassie suggested diplomatically.

"Could I?" Tom wondered.

"We can't grant the power. The device the Andalite used to grant it to us probably got vaporized along with the rest of his stuff," Jake admitted. "But you could give us advice on how to counter-infiltrate The Sharing. Let's see how they like a taste of their own medicine!"

"Hell yeah! Not only that, but intel on other Yeerk activities," Tom said with righteous fury. The Andalite would've been proud of the anger that seeped out of his tone in saying 'Yeerk'.

.

It wouldn't surprise people to know Tom played basketball, at least he had before The Sharing. Jake had once feared reporting he hadn't made the middle school team. That had been about his last normal thought. "Maybe I could still make a decent college team if this ever ends," Tom hoped.

.

"I always thought Cousin Rachel could be a bear and Marco was a dumb ape. You sure know how to pick 'em, midget." Jake was hardly a small boy, but still not as imposing as Tom, and the nickname had carried over from when they were younger. "At least it's not Cassie calling you that," Tom whispered. Once that sunk in, the boys got loud and Jake got red.

.

Jake cared not one whit for the teasing, and he doubted the targets did either. It was coming from the real Tom, not a Yeerk mind control slug infesting his head, not any more. Having Tom back offered a better chance to beat those who had taken him.


	2. The Truth

"Haven't seen my boys like this in awhile!" Steve Berenson said as Tom and Jake walked in together. "Tom's been too busy with The Sharing," he observed. "Figured it was just things changing as he grew up, that I wasn't supposed to mess with it," he admitted.

"To put it very lightly, Dad, The Sharing is the problem," Tom responded in a whisper. "I discovered a dark secret behind the Boy Scout shit and Jake helped me get away. It's a very long story, one we need to tell Mom too while we're sitting down in private."

.

It was easy enough to find Jean Grundle Berenson. As a freelance writer, she worked from home. In fact, Jake and Tom had been lucky to find their father at this hour. He was a pediatrician, unwilling to rush through a room full of sick kids the way an office worker might be inclined to skip out on paperwork. He still was saddled with lots of pencil-pushing, though. In fact, some of Tom's impolite vocabulary came from his father's commentary on health insurance companies.

.

Tom had already said there weren't any Yeerk spy devices in the house. Jake and Tom headed for the basement, where passerby wouldn't notice anything suspicious where they might aboveground. Their basement didn't even have any windows at ground level.

.

"Visser Three would think Stalin was bush league," Tom said.

"But what if Stalin had Yeerk technology? Both bad bastards, just with different tools available," Jake countered. It was a far cry from hanging out with Marco arguing over whether Iron Man could beat Batman.

.

"Honey, Tom thinks The Sharing is a front for the mob or something," Dr. Berenson explained as they gathered in the basement. He understood his sons' serious demeanor. However, like the rest of humanity, he would have trouble grasping the severity of the situation. This force sunk even lower than humanity at its ugliest.

"Worse than the mafia. Hostile aliens," Tom said somberly. "The Yeerks, they're called, and I have plenty of things to call them."

"What do they need The Sharing for?" Jean wondered.

"They're slugs that crawl inside someone's head to control their brain. They use The Sharing to talk people into that instead of taking them by force," Tom explained.

"And you fell for it? What's her name?" Steve wondered.

"Tiffany Smith. She was already infested," Tom admitted. _So that wasn't just their father teasing._

"Well, hot girls make guys do really stupid things," Jake pointed out, hoping that sort of thing wouldn't happen to him. Someone might imply that Jake was safe because Cassie supposedly wasn't pretty. _Even if Marco or Tom did that, it would go over like a lead balloon_, Jake thought. Cassandra Atkins was cute in her own way, and an incredibly kind person to anyone and anything.

"But they had to take me, kicking and screaming mind you. I had shown up at one of the _full member _meetings, and saw the truth – an alien infested by their leader." _No wonder Tom had been so angered by the sight of Visser Three during the Yeerk pool raid_, Jake realized.

"Now how'd you get out?" Steve wondered.

.

"That's where I come in," Jake tag-teamed. They were gradually bringing in the weirdness. Their parents seemed to believe them. Jake and Tom were children, but still too old to believe overactive imaginations. Their mother, as a writer, might have an instinct for whether people were just storytelling.

"The Andalites are an alien race at war with the Yeerks. They sent a fleet to Earth but it got intercepted. One of their fighter pilots crash-landed in that abandoned construction site," Jake began.

"Going through there was even more dangerous than I thought," Jean observed.

"Let me guess, doing something like that, Marco was there with you," Steve piled on.

"And Cassie, Rachel and Tobias," Jake agreed.

"The pilot told us as much as he could before the Yeerks came to mop up. Then he gave us a powerful piece of Andalite technology. The power to morph, to take the form of any animal you've touched since gaining that power," Jake continued.

"That seems rather useful," Steve said. "Especially since Cassie's family runs that wild animal shelter and her mom's a vet at The Gardens," he realized. Out of shock, he was barely able to retain his composure, but he was still gamely trying to speak clearly.

"So you turned into big animals to rescue your big brother," Jean guessed, correctly.

.

"Rachel was an elephant, not a bear," Jake pointed out to Tom.

"I had reasons for not thinking clearly," Tom said defensively.

"He was right that Cassie is a workhorse, though. Marco practices gorilla warfare, but I went for a tiger," Jake said right before beginning the morph.

It was an incredibly odd sensation as body parts grew and shrunk, stretched and compressed, skin changed. _Thank the Andalite scientists that it didn't hurt, at least_. This said nothing of how utterly weird it looked. All of them except Cassie looked like hell during the process. Jean screamed; Jake supposed his father's medical experience kept him from being grossed out too.

((Those in morph can communicate by telepathy,)) Jake broadcasted once he finished. His parents were evidently as surprised to hear the words in their heads as he had been with the crash-landed Elfangor. ((So can Andalites in their natural state,)) Jake added, likely why their technology was designed this way.

Andalites were covered in fur and as such went unclothed, so morphing hadn't been designed with clothes in mind. The Animorphs, even Cassie, could only morph in and out of very thin clothes. They'd ruined shoes and heavy clothes figuring this out. Jake reappeared in his thin T-shirt and skintight bike shorts. The morph and demorph definitely had convinced his parents, after the conversation mostly had.

.

"But since these alien slugs control people's brains, how'd you get him to come with you?" Jean asked, attempting to plug a plot hole.

"They have a critical weakness," Tom said with righteous fury. "Every three days they have to crawl out of their hosts and swim in a pool that simulates the effects of their home sun. So for a short time Yeerk victims become prisoners instead of mind control slaves," he explained, having learned the hard way. "And midget here decided to lead a prison break!" he said triumphantly.

.

"We can also morph small or otherwise innocuous creatures for spying purposes. That's the way we found out how and when to strike. 'Homer' took a stroll along the beach during a Sharing meeting," Jake said of morphing the family dog.

"That power is amazing. I'm sure that's not the end of it. What's the catch?" Jean said.

"If it's been more than two hours, you're stuck. Tobias is a hawk now. I was gonna roost him in the attic and bring him hamburger or something."

"Yeah, we gotta take care of our folks," Tom agreed. "Tell that to his no-good relatives."

"I'll tell the uncle here who doesn't care that he's with the aunt out east who doesn't care, and vice versa," Jake countered.

"Well, him and Tom will both be hiding out here," Steve observed.

"We were gonna assume the Yeerks lost track of me during the escape. I could camp in the basement. With Mom working from home, it won't be odd that the house is busy. Unfortunately, midget can't give me the morphing power just because he has it himself. Being a leopard would have been cool."

"They think we're Andalites that survived the space battle, considering the power to morph. They aren't looking for humans, and we better not give them the idea to," Jake declared. "It's not just The Sharing. Anyone might be a Controller who's acting normal," Jake warned.

.

"How'd your parents take it?" Marco asked as soon as they got settled at the barn.

"They believed the truth and understand the need to hide Tom," Jake reported. "But what next?" he worried.

"Well, we can't exactly ask President Flores-Rivera to borrow a few thousand Marines," Marco quipped. "No way, Alejandro."

Jake figured the Yeerks wouldn't have infiltrated that far up. _Would they?_ he worried. Even if they really hadn't, how could they reach the White House without tipping off Controllers along the way? How could they get the President to believe? The stranger of such significance presented a far greater challenge than their own relatives.

.

"Probably should tell my mom too, especially to let her know what really happened to Tom," Rachel announced. Naomi Jackson was divorced from Dan Berenson. However, it had been relatively amicable. Amongst other things, she still thought of Tom and Jake as her nephews. Dan and Naomi had been driven apart by busy careers, him as a newscaster and her as a tax lawyer. She knew there were things worse than the IRS, but was about to learn how much worse.

.

"Jordan and Sara aren't hearing a damn thing," Rachel insisted on behalf of her younger sisters.

"Yeah, we're too young for this shit, let alone them. And besides, they might not be able to stay quiet," Marco pointed out on two fronts. Marco, Cassie and Tobias were all only children. Steve and Dan had a sister Ellen who now lived in another town with her husband their four children. They were safe there; so were Jean's family in some other city. They'd definitely be left out of it.

.

For now, the Animorphs were still stalling until another Andalite fleet arrived. Their spirits were boosted by the rest of the raid on the Yeerk Pool; it was not the end, not even the beginning of the end, but perhaps the end of the beginning.


	3. The Cave

Jake was bringing a lot of Tom's stuff down to the basement to lower the risk of anybody seeing his older brother through the windows.

The Sharing used its activities to draw people in as well as provide cover stories for meetings of those who were already Controllers. Either way, camping trips were a common choice. That was proving to be a silver lining, since Tom's gear could go on the lowest level of their house instead of in a tent or cabin. "Just get me the sleeping bag. Mattresses? I don't need no steenkin' mattresses. Those are for old guys with bad backs, like Chapman."

.

"Though, as we know, he's evil even for an assistant principal," Jake responded. Hanging out with Marco their entire lives, some of his flair for dark humor was bound to rub off on Jake.

"Yeah, the Yeerk in his head is Visser Three's third-in-command. Iniss two-two-six, Sub-Visser Eighty-two," Tom explained. "The Yeerk Empire has a few dozen Vissers and several hundred Sub-Vissers. I haven't heard about any Vissers here besides you-know-who, but there have gotta be at least a few other Subs around." _Boys our age should be talking about video game strategy, not serious military intelligence_, Jake mused.

.

After the bulk of the camping equipment, Jake started bringing down Tom's clothes. "Clippers? What's next, Raiders merch?" Jake teased as he pulled out a red and blue jersey.

"Hey, the Lakers aren't so hot lately, midget," Tom replied. Being free to pull this dumb brother shit still meant the world to them. Besides, they were clinging to what few remotely normal things remained in their lives. "You know I don't like football," he said teasingly.

"Too bad we don't like hockey either. Kings got another Cup; I only noticed because that and the NBA Finals games were on different days," Jake pointed out.

.

"Guess I'm a glutton for punishment, midget," Tom admitted.

They both recognized a greater weight behind the words. Yet Jake decided to continue poking fun at it. _Marco would be proud_, Jake assessed. "About that … I saw your posters. I'm not sure you have the best taste in pinups. Are you trying to piss Dad off?" Their old man may or may not have been bothered by the general idea, but Jenny McCarthy aggravated him to no end, and Tom had put up her October 1993 Playboy centerfold.

"I'm not taking her medical advice," Tom pointed out. "Yeah, pretty much every goddamn doctor thinks her science is bullshit, and even if she were right, she's acting as if autism is worse than the fucking horrible diseases vaccines go after."

"Dad's right about that," Jake agreed. "But I'm afraid that now that we're in a war, whether to be a fan of unethical entertainers will be the least of our moral quandaries. And since Mom'll be down here for the laundry room, pantry or whatever, you probably should put that stuff away anyway."

"Yeah, us guys can act like that by ourselves, but we gotta behave when the ladies are around," Tom said. "You can look at some of the stuff yourself if you want."

"Not my style," Jake said defensively. "Marco wouldn't mind some of it, though."

"If Cassie says anything … three words for ya, Jeremy Jason McCole," Tom shot back triumphantly. Mr. McCole was a teen heartthrob known for his role on the TV show _Power House_. Apparently Cassie was a fan. " .com interacts quite a lot with .com," Tom pointed out. "I've been on there for basketball stuff, couldn't help but looking around for our friends." Tom threw a falsetto that sounded nothing like Cassie or Rachel, but was funny nevertheless. "I watch _Power House_ for the plots … it really does have some good plots."

"Suppose you gotta stay offline. Who knows what they can trace even if you don't make it obvious," Jake advised prudently.

.

A few days later, Jake took a bunch of Tom's stuff over to Marco's. Tom couldn't use it all in his limited hiding status, and even before The Sharing took him, he had more than he knew what to do with. "When your prized possessions start to weigh you down…" Dad had hummed. _The Beatles, And Your Bird Can Sing_. He'd made clear he thought _Revolver _was one of the great LP's. Jake and Tom agreed it was good, but leaned towards stuff of their own era.

.

The Crosettis didn't quite have that problem anymore. Marco's dad Peter had lost his good computer engineering job after being unable to deal with Eva's death. He was doing some sort of grunt work now. Nothing against that, somebody had to do it, but Peter wasn't suited to it. Their current neighborhood didn't scare Jake so much anymore. Street punks were nothing compared to Controllers. Still, Jake brought his bike inside rather than leaving it outside, even locked up.

.

Jake had more than Tom's things to unload. Marco's father opened the door. "We heard about your brother. Sadly, I have too much of an idea what youse guys are going through." The other Animorphs weren't telling their parents yet after all. They didn't need the worry. If the Animorphs had to disappear on a mission, the Berenson parents could corroborate alibis.

"Yeah, it's starting to sink in that he ain't coming back," Jake choked out fairly convincingly. "It ain't helping to have his things around. He had nearly a foot on Marco, but I figured my buddy could use some of the things besides the clothes."

.

Marco had a boom box out in his room. "Listening to one of Dad's old tapes," he pointed out, handing the case to Jake.

_The Ramones – Brain Drain_, Jake read. "Zero Zero UFO, real funny," he announced.

"Would you expect anything less from me?" Marco stated. "Don't wanna be buried in a pet 'sematary'," he went on.

"You sing as well as you drive," Jake countered. If his performance in racing video games was any indication, it was a good thing for people on or near California roads that he was only 14.

"Seems I'm gonna be operating a stick soon," Marco said as he saw Tom's magazines. Admittedly, that would distract from the backpack, duct tape, tools, and assorted media.

.

It would soon be time to publicly fake Tom's death. To free humans, he'd drowned after being caught in a rip current. Fighting with The Sharing about what happened to Tom would be too close to the truth. Jake needed Controllers poking around like he needed a hole in his head. To the Yeerks, he'd died trying to escape the Yeerk pool, his body rendered unidentifiable by Visser Three's fireballs. As such, his 'friends' from The Sharing were unlikely to care. _We _are _counting on Yeerk callousness_, Jake thought. If the Yeerks found them, it would definitely be all over for him, his friends and family personally. It may very well be the end for humanity as a whole. It wouldn't bode well for free peoples throughout the galaxy.

.

Their father the doctor was all too familiar with when kids couldn't be saved. Their mother the writer could be creative. Knowing it wasn't true was comforting but also macabre. Marco also was all too familiar with this. It was almost the two year anniversary of his mother's disappearance, 'also' lost at sea, so the grief for somebody would be real. "Wish I could at least pull a Tom Sawyer and watch it myself," the very much alive Tom said as his family left the house.

.

_Thomas Stephen Berenson, December 28 1997 – September 27 2014, Son and brother full of energy, yet Nature is stronger than us all_. Tom's stone would be placed next to that of Marco's mother. _Eva Morales Crosetti, January 23 1970 – October 11 2012, Devoted wife and mother, Taken by the sea they all loved_.


End file.
